I'm also inclined to agree with the book reviewer's (blackstarrreview.com) conclusion. Baum's computational outlook seems quite limiting. I think that evolutionary and DNA arguments can't adequately explain or model self-aware creatures. In order to filter the background noise (and life is almost all noise!) organisms need a powerful filtering method or be purpose-built bugs. Human awareness has the added complexity of culture. Taking or looking at pictures, for example, we toss out gobs of visual stimuli to see what we have learned to see. Evolution or DNA has no substantial influence on that. Humans in my view are post-evolutionary creatures. To explain how we are natural selection is too slow to be given practical consideration. (So now that we have opposable thumbs we can forge our own un-natural way!) Naked Ape, socio-biology arguments become moot I think. The image waiting to be taken idea, dear to my heart, can't be explained very well as a hard-wired response. It is cultural. I've learned to conform to or consciously deviate from the way my unique cultural perspective has shaped me. I learned in Photo 101 to try and reach for some sort of Zen-like ultimate awareness. Talk about filtering out! AZ LOOKAROUND - Since 1978 Build a 120/35mm Lookaround! The Lookaround E-Book FREE COPY http://www.panoramacamera.us > -------- Original Message -------- > Subject: [SPAM] Re: Photography as thought without words > From: David Dyer-Bennet <dd-b@xxxxxxxx> > Date: Mon, August 09, 2010 12:03 pm > To: List for Photo/Imaging Educators - Professionals - Students > <photoforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> > > > On Sun, August 8, 2010 21:41, Kim Mosley wrote: > > See this webpage about Steiglitz's Equivalent series: > > http://tinyurl.com/233awpf > > > > I can hardly imagine a photograph that doesn't suggest a thought. Some are > > more overt, like Wynn Bullock who claimed he made photographs that > > illustrated the time-space continuum. > > Sure, but looking at a view out a window suggests thoughts, too; I think > that's a statement about the human mind, rather than about photographs. > > > John Dewey on "What is Thought": > > http://www.brocku.ca/MeadProject/Dewey/Dewey_1910a/Dewey_1910_a.html One > > definition he speaks of is anything that goes through our mind. > > And, incidentally, what is "mind"? And is it only the part we're > conscious of? > > > David is certainly right that there are many definitions of thought... but > > there are scientific definitions as well as philosophical definitions. > > See: > > http://www.blackstarreview.com/rev-0150.html > > Certainly scientists are attempting to define it; that's what scientists > do when faced with a problem like this. My point is that we haven't > gotten very far yet -- definitions aren't widely accepted. Which that > review nicely supports. > > -- > David Dyer-Bennet, dd-b@xxxxxxxx; http://dd-b.net/ > Snapshots: http://dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/data/ > Photos: http://dd-b.net/photography/gallery/ > Dragaera: http://dragaera.info
